Trace Elliot and Ampeg

I have a whole trace stack ah3007 into two trace 4x10s. On thursday night I did a gig using an Amepg 4x10 and 1x15 at first i thought excellent I can use an Ampeg. When I plugged in I thought..........my bass sounds pretty crap it sounded muddy and overall it was just plain. I did another gig on friday night and I used my trace stack and my bass just sounded 100000 times better than the ampeg. I found I cut through a hell of a lot more with the trace than the ampeg. Im not putting ampeg down but just saying my experiences.

Funny, my experience with ampeg cabs has been the same. I also use a Trace amp. IMO ampeg cabs sound very dirty. They have a gritty kinda tone to them. Which by themselves can sound pretty good. But in a band setting they don't sit in the mix as well. I've never owned any ampeg cabs, just borrowed/used them. So it's possable with the right EQ settings they could be good. Also, I think they sound better with ampeg heads.

Trace Elliot amps have a ton of mid range. Which is the key to cutting through in a band settting. TE cabs are a good match. Personally I don't love them...but they're much better w/ a TE amp than ampegs. I just switched to Bag End cabs w/ my AH250 7 band, and its a match made in heaven. I picked up an S15-d & an S15x-d. I've never heard my tone sound so good. In a band setiing they're phenominal! Plus compact, I'm sick of lugging big cabs around.

Yeah, I think it just depends on how your amp is set up. Plus your TE head is designed for those TE cabinets, and if you have your amp set up for the TE cabs (ie you're not boosting any midrange because of the mid range bias on those cabs) then the Ampeg's would indeed sound muddy. I'm sure with about 15 minutes of messing around with your amp you could get a pretty desirable tone with the Ampeg cabinets as well.

i didnt use my TE head with the Ampeg, I uased all ampeg stack including head the only thing that was mine were the lead and the bass. The settings on his amp wernt majorly stupid he had pretty much a flat eq. Eitherway to me my TE sounded better

Bwah, isn't that a matter of taste? I just love the way my ampeg setup sounds in my band, blends in wonderful. It's kind of massive attack, pj harvey, nin sort of music and I put a very deep, fat bass under it. Already had a lot of compliments on that tone. But I wouldn't use it when a more hifi sound was required, then I'd more go into trace... A bit the tube-ss discussion...
Grtz,
Tom

Being a TE freak, you know I love their heads and their cabs. They definately cut through extremely well. In a rock, metal, or punk setting you can still be heard clearly competing against to loud guitarist.

As for Ampeg, I can't put them down as it is good equipment. I even like Ampeg for the most part. The only thing is that their cabs don't really work for me. In particular, the SVT series of cabs. They just lack the defintion that I require from a cab.

Being a TE freak, you know I love their heads and their cabs. They definately cut through extremely well. In a rock, metal, or punk setting you can still be heard clearly competing against to loud guitarist.

As for Ampeg, I can't put them down as it is good equipment. I even like Ampeg for the most part. The only thing is that their cabs don't really work for me. In particular, the SVT series of cabs. They just lack the defintion that I require from a cab.

Now an Ampeg head with a Trace cab might be pretty sweet, hmm....

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It doesnt, but, ive only tried it with an ampeg 200T or something (pretty low powered SS amp) with a trace 2x15

So the head was probably the weak link there, but with a proper SVT, might be good

Ampeg just seem to have a very different 'flavour' than other brands, i tried an ampeg stack in a store (B5R or SVT CL into a 810CL or 410 + 115 respectively) and it had what i guess is the ampeg sound many people love, i however didn't (good thing, cause ampeg is so expensive here, so i wont be GAS'ing for it now ).